I have been laying low since the prison. No one has come for me yet. The news on the eyepad says that the enquiry is ongoing. So, we shall see what comes of it.

But following that, I did realise something. I needed to be more careful when I was trying to fit in. I needed to find a steadier supply of food, workers and company. Female company. Dracula had three wives. I can’t even get one.

I didn’t like the idea of going back on Tinder. It was too time-consuming, so instead, I decided to be more traditional and step out into the new world and meet new women. I decided that the best thing to do was to head out into the local Club Scene of Cove Town. I donned my finest clothes – my tailcoat, top hat, cravat and high leather boots. I asked Raven if she would like to accompany me, however, I feel that she hasn’t been very interested since the night we shared together. I send her messages but she just ignores them.

“Ghosted,” Ergo said to me. I didn’t feel that calling a psychic would be what I would have to do in order to get female attention, but alas, I put it on my to-do list.

This courting game was so much easier back in my day. You would simply approach a woman’s father and settle on the price for her hand in marriage. Usually, it was a goat, a bag of carrots or on rare occasions, a dozen chicken eggs. I feel that in this modern era, a female wouldn’t appreciate being married off to a stranger for a sack of vegetables, but I have some in the storeroom just in case.

Ergo pulled out his eyephone. Honestly, the thought of carrying a tiny voice in your pocket at all times terrifies the death out of me. I hear enough voices already. Ergo used the eyephone and called the Taxman to collect me from the estate.

“One please,” Ergo said slowly. “Forty minutes. Yes, I’ll wait.” Ergo stood there staring at me whilst a soft jingle played in his ear. His face didn’t move an inch the entire time.

I waited patiently, nursing a glass of port and I checked myself over once more, straightening my hat, tightening my belt and checking if the cow I had just drunk hadn’t left any stains around my mouth. It was rather impolite to try and court a female with evidence of your latest meal around your mouth. That’s why I never used brothels.

Finally, the Taxman arrived and I slipped into the back of his steel horse.

“Very fancy!” I said, admiring the side of the creature.

“Prius,” the Taxman said.

“Gesundheit!” I smiled.

The ride there was extraordinary and I was so excited. My first real trip to the Club Scene! I took my club out and waved it to the Taxman to show him.

“What do you think?” I asked him politely, showing off the bulbous end clad in wood and steel. “I have killed many with it before you know. It’s great for crushing knee caps!” The Taxman became rather loud, shouting and screaming at me to exit his chariot at once. I tried to calm him down, telling him it was only for the women I was going to find, to which he continued to get more worried and upset. Finally, his chariot seized to a halt and he threw a leather pouch at me filled with coins and paper with a young lady’s face on it. I could only assume it was from the overcharging that I had been subjected to by the Mayor’s office a few weeks back. I took the payment, thanked the screeching Taxman with a nod of my hat and slipped out into the night air. I watched as he flew down the street, moving straight through a huge red eye that hung from a building. Again, I found this strange, but who was I to question the ways of the modern world?

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I moved through the streets, acquiring the eyes of many women and also a few men. They would smile at me, gazing upon my attire and the club in my hand. I saw a long string of cattle standing outside of a building. Loud music pulsed into the night, and those waiting were showing more flesh than I had ever seen in my entire life. I must say, dear reader, that if I couldn’t see what they had eaten the night before, I could certainly smell it.

There was one female that dazzled my eye, however. Around her mid-twenties, red hair and was slim like she had been afflicted by the plague. A fond time in my life. I moved to her, slipping through the crowd of onlookers. She turned to face me, and I bowed, extending my hand, the club behind my back.

“A pleasure, my lady,” I said. She appeared uneasy, smiling thinly. I had gathered an audience of onlookers. They were all observing this young female with envious eyes. She slowly reached for my hand and placed her fingers on my palm. I caressed the top of her hand with my thumb, before laying my lips on her skin. She smelt like roses. Maybe that was her name? Rose?

Her eyes were staring into mine, which always boded well for me. When cattle make eye contact with a vampire, they are drawn into your power much easier. Why do you think Tony Robbins is so influential? I’ll say no more.

“A drink, my lady?” I spoke. She nodded. I passed my club to a passing gentleman. I had no use for it now. My club had caught the eye, but my gaze had held it. He took it welcomingly, and a short time later I heard something smash and a rabble of screams followed. I cared not. We moved to a quiet corner and I ordered a bottle of wine and paid with a pouch of gold coins. The waiter of the establishment was thrilled with my payment so much he removed his apron, spat onto the floor and ran into the street cheering and holding the pouch. The fool, I thought. That wouldn’t buy you a wife these days.

I and Rose sat for a short time, looking into the eyes of each other. I could see her body reacting to me. I could see it tingling along her skin, dancing like a beautiful song that finds its way into her heart.

Lust.

We spoke for a short while. She told me she was unmarried and was working in a morgue in the hospital.

I could believe my luck. Beautiful, unmarried and works with death. It’s like Beelzebub had finally passed fortune on me. He did owe me a favour after what I went through in London in the 1500’s. All I’ll say is when someone offers you money to ride a pig through the gallows, just say no.

“I find the dead make great company,” I said. She queried me, but I laughed, and she followed. She may not be my Raven, but Rose could be useful. I just had one thing to do before I left her for the night.

I requested her hand, and she brought it to me, unravelling her arm into my hands like a snake uncoiling from a tree. I took it, and turned her wrist towards me. I looked at her once more. She had her eyes fixed on mine. I carved my nail along her flesh and it opened with ease. I drank, suckling lightly. Just enough to taste her. She was good, and I could hear her heart slowing.

It’s okay, I whispered in her mind. You won’t remember this in the morning.

I finished my meal. I took my own hand and lightly cut my own wrist and poured my own life force into her glass of red, and she drank it wholeheartedly.

“If you weren’t useful, I would have consumed all of you,” I said. Rose sat back, barely awake. A vampire’s blood is a powerful intoxicant. Why do you think Coca-Cola got so popular? Rose rode that wave of vitamin V and by the time she managed to open her eyes, I had left her.

A vampire that trades blood with a human can create another vampire, but only IF they let them drink enough. It is a risky thing to do, but I have aeons of experience. A small dribble in the cattle’s mouth will connect her with me without turning her. If she has undead in her possession, then she will have blood too. I can harvest both her, her corpses and the blood of the cattle that would go to waste.

I strode back home, finding my club sticking out of a smashed window. Police officers diving on the cattle I had leant it to. I removed it, using it as a cane and began to whistle into the night air. 24-hour cattle willing to sit with strangers. Terrifying the Taxman away with clubs. Corpses able to be picked for housekeeping, and blood frozen and ready for consumption.

I love the modern world.

* R.W